The National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS) currently tracks antimicrobial resistance data at the level of the meat case, the harvest facility and across cases of human foodborne illness. However, no such effort exists at the level of the swine farm, yet.
Pipestone’s Karyn Havas, DVM, wants to change that. She recently received a $202,555 grant through the International Consortium for Antimicrobial Stewardship in Agriculture (ICASA) to develop a protocol that tracks antibiotic use across large-scale commercial swine production systems and compares it in real-time with its respective on-farm antibiotic use.
Havas is receiving one of three grants totaling $377,503 to track antimicrobial usage and support better-informed antibiotic treatment for bacteria that cause diseases in swine and beef cattle.
“This project expands upon previous research, including data collection from participating swine farms and preliminary statistical analysis of antimicrobial use and resistance data. The research team continues to collect data across pathogens of food safety and veterinary significance from swine farms based on NARMS standards and relate this information with antibiotic usage data to produce measurable outcomes. Pipestone’s research aims to enhance the marketability of pork, improve animal welfare and launch the United States swine industry to the forefront of AMR surveillance globally,” ICASA said in a release.
Pipestone and the National Pork Board provided matching funds for a $405,111 investment.
“The animal agriculture industry is committed to doing its part to lessen antimicrobial resistance and ensure antibiotics are effective for people and animals for decades to come,” ICASA said. “Strategies to reduce the need for antimicrobial usage in animal agriculture are being considered to combat this risk of AMR. However, banning all antibiotics would adversely impact animal health, welfare, performance and production, increasing food safety risks and economic losses. The industry needs to maintain the use of antimicrobials to control AMR and to make informed medical decisions.
Havas was a US Army Veterinary Corps Officer through August 2014 when she retired from service. She then served as the Diagnostic Services Section Head for the USDA Foreign Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory at the Plum Island Animal Disease Center. She went on to serve as a Section Chief of Infectious Disease Epidemiology and a founding faculty member of the Cornell Master of Public Health Program where she continued to work on transboundary swine diseases as well as swine brucellosis. Today, she lives in Pennsylvania and acts as the Director of Transboundary Animal Disease Research as part of the Pipestone Research team.
ICASA also awarded grants to:
- Thomas Darbonne from Ergense Inc. a $50,000 grant through ICASA to develop an acoustic monitoring technique to inform antibiotic treatment of cattle for BRD.
- Natalia Cernicchiaro and David Renter from K-State a $124,948 grant through ICASA to improve understanding of how feedlot cattle are classified based on BRD risk.
